


red right hand

by rathxritter



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Hollywood, Alternate Universe - No SHIELD (Marvel), Angst with a Happy Ending, F/M, Marriage Proposal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-06
Updated: 2019-09-06
Packaged: 2020-11-01 23:04:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,114
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20538050
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rathxritter/pseuds/rathxritter
Summary: Every town has its stories. They call them Miss Americana and the Heartbreak Prince. Some say it’s a love story, some consider it a bloody tragedy. Maybe it’s both.





	red right hand

**Author's Note:**

  * For [amazingjemma](https://archiveofourown.org/users/amazingjemma/gifts).

> Based on [this lovely edit made by amazingjemma!!.](https://rathxritter.tumblr.com/post/187421337002/bigbysnows-fitzsimmons-miss-americana-the)
> 
> Title comes from Milton's "Paradise Lost" (book II): "or from above/ Should intermitted vengeance arm again / His red right hand to plague us?" 
> 
> Unbeta'd.

Every town has its stories.

It doesn't matter whether they're myths based on a grain of truth, or if they're real historical anecdotes. No one cares: it's the kind of stuff that makes life interesting, it's something to talk about, something that keeps imagination running. People live on such stories, they feed them constantly by bending the truth and adding infinite details, some smaller and more irrelevant than others. They whisper and murmur and the story changes, grows, expands and transforms and at the end it is hardly the same as it was at the beginning. It's a matter of points of view, of perspectives, and not two versions are alike.

Here, in a small town in the north of Scotland, close enough to the sea for the air to smell of salt, where there are more farms than houses, more animals than people, and where ponies sometimes can be spotted wearing knitted sweaters, there's one story in particular that caused a lot of talking. No longer discussed, having lost all its shine and glamour, the piece of gossip has slowly become old and outdated. Now it lives on in assumptions and archived tabloid articles, twitter feeds and comments on long abandoned Instagram accounts.

They call them Miss Americana and The Heartbreak Prince. Runaways, strangers and a perfect match. Some say it's a love story while others consider it to be a bloody tragedy. Maybe it's both. It depends on who's telling the story, these things always do.

* * *

They meet at one of those parties where everyone who's someone is there.

Rich people, the elite, the best and the brightest: some of them have worked hard to get to the top of the ladder, some were born in privilege, some have powerful enemies. 

Jemma Anne Simmons: British rose and Hollywood sweetheart, one Oscar nomination, two BAFTAs and an Olivier. She rose to fame while on a show in the West End, a show that gave her an Olivier at age sixteen, then she moved on and did some Channel4 movies that no one ever watched, until she moved across the pond and was cast in a mediocre TV show that made her famous and ruined her life. A supportive fan base, a couple of friends, and a relationship destroyed by gossips and assumptions.

Leopold James Fitz: Glaswegian, his accent is not as strong as people always imagine it to be which is considered by some as a betrayal of his roots. They say he's got two friends, maybe three, and an uncountable number of enemies. He's the founder of an empire and some exaggerate and say that he's everything that's wrong with society as a whole. He's a genius and for someone who shows such an interest in humanitarian causes and humanitarian aid, he sure acts like an arsehole.

Rumour has it that Jemma Simmons is the one who saw through all of it.

They're at HYDRA, John Garrett's new place. It's cold and modern, all chrome surfaces and bright white lights. It's a renowned place because the staff and the owner himself always close an eye on the illegal substances - white lines on shiny surfaces, ready to be inhaled, ready to leave dusty residues under people's noses. It's a place for people who know how to have a good time even though trashing it is out of the question. 

The music is loud, pounding, and makes it impossible to start a decent conversation. Then again, no one goes to spend their night at HYDRA's if they want to talk - dinner out of town is generally considered the better option for that. In a corner someone opens a champagne bottle that costs more than some people earn in a week: the cork flies into the air and white foam starts running down the neck of the bottle, on the hands of the person who's holding it, and then drips on the floor - ignored. The bottle is passed around and the yellow and frizzy liquid is gulped eagerly while people string together obscenities and lines of encouragement that incite people to imbibe.

Their gazes meet. Jemma is wearing a purple dress, the dark fabric makes her skin look paler and exposes her shoulders and most of her back. Fitz is wearing a three piece, his jacket dismissed on the chair next to him, and he looks like a gangster from the early nineteenth century during the power struggles in Birmingham. Hair combed to the side. Cold and magnetic, he looks like the asshole everyone thinks he is.

"Will someone be joining you?" she asks as she places herself in front of him, one of her arms resting on the cold surface of the counter.

"Fucking hell, I hope not." He laughs and she smiles. "Is it true that you were involved in some drug scandal a couple of years ago?"

"Is it true that you go around breaking hearts?"

He scoffs. "Why?"

Because if it's true, maybe he can break hers and she'll feel something for the first time in weeks. 

Jemma raises an eyebrow and leans in, her eyes wandering from his blue eyes that look clearer under the LED lights to his lips and back up again. Things are serious and the air is electric, someone bumps into her and she ignores them: there's longing and there's hunger. Fitz runs the tip of his tongue on his lips, wetting them. Instinctively she takes his hand and she is rather surprised when he follows her to the women's bathroom.

Once inside, she presses her lips on his, tentatively at first, a silent question he somehow has to answer: they can do this or she can go back home and take matters in her own hands. It doesn't take long, Fitz's mouth is on hers almost immediately and they walk towards the bathroom counter and she sits on it, her legs dangling from the top and her backside partially pressed against the grey countertop sink, she wraps her legs around his waist and the bulge in his pants presses against her.

The idea of someone walking in on them now or later, makes the whole thing illicit and exciting and even more arousing.

Neither of their mouths tastes like alcohol as they start kissing - tongues touching, slippery and moist muscles. 

The only two people not to have touched a drop: alcohol enhances her misery and makes her soppy, though she's not impartial to a decent glass of gin, drunk in the solitude of her own home; what's his excuse, she wants to ask. Instead, with the last bit of self-control that she can master, she says, "I don't want to do this here."

It's squalid. It's dirty and cheap and aseptic. If she has to have sex with a stranger, she thinks, she'd rather have it in a place that doesn't smell of piss and ammonia. Somewhere else. Somewhere nice.

"Let's go back to mine," whispers Fitz as he steps back. The party is over anyway and the heavy drinking was about to begin as they were leaving the room. It won't be fun: the stench of alcohol brings back memories and only makes him feel nauseous. "That is, if you want to. We can go back to mine if you want to."

She nods. "Yes, alright. The paps-"

"We'll use the back door. I can make arrangements... For a car."

"Alright. I'll be there in a jiffy," she replies as she jumps down from the counter and fixes her dress.

Just as Fitz is about to leave the room, a girl enters - her heels tick against the floor. She looks at them both, studies them with her mouth half opened, and then all but stares at Jemma. Later that night, that same girls is going to tell her friends that Jemma Simmons had sex in a public restroom. Some of her friends will believe her, some won't: they say that the Jemma Simmons would never do that, she would never have sex with a stranger, they all know that.

They start in the car, unable to hold their hands off each other. By the time they finally reach his place, they skip over the formalities and head to the bedroom where they take all the time they need to get undress and ungallantly lie down on the bed - fumbling hands in exploration, after a while Fitz retrieves a packet of condoms from his bedside table, unopened and bought for a relationship that never reached its fulfilment.

"You know," she tells him as he struggles to open the plastic wrap. "A bed is much more comfortable than a bathroom counter."

And Fitz laughs - a warm laugh that starts with a snort that makes her stomach flutter. 

"Need help?" she asks.

They must look ridiculous, she's sure of it, and for some reason she doesn't want it to be any different.

"No, got it," he replies. "Bloody thing."

It's surprising, once they resume, to find tenderness as well as urgency. Each touch is soft, a gentle and quiet promise to take care of the other. A pleasant and unexpected dichotomy. 

Just as she thinks that she won't resist any longer, he pushes himself up until his arms are around her and they're wrapped in a silent and motionless embrace. Their skin is sticky and covered in sweat and her head buried in the crook of his neck while he gently moves his hands on her back, caressing her skin. He whispers her name - a strange new word that mixes with a whimper of pleasure, she doesn't seem to notice and he's glad for it, let him bask in this mere illusion of closeness and intimacy for a little while longer. Hungry animals both of them. It's impossible to say who's the one to crave for intimacy the most.

In the morning they have breakfast together - tea and some Digestives - and she's surprised to find out that his place looks different from what she imagined it to be: more welcoming, warmer. It looks like a home rather than just a place to sleep, it looks lived, it looks comfortable.

They follow each other on social media, for minutes on end their phones blow up with notifications of the other liking some pictures. Such a simple action does not go unnoticed, people on Twitter start to speculate. Some tag her in them. Some say that she's a bad, bad girl. She doesn't care, she sees a post of his about St. Aubyn's novels and ends up buying them that same evening - books can tell you a lot about someone and she wants to know everything about Fitz.

Leopold James Fitz is a walking contradiction, it seems impossible now to buy his act and believe him.

* * *

Every story starts somewhere.

They have to, but they're also shaped by actions and subjectivity. Everyone has their own narrative and frames it accordingly, bends it to their will. 

Speculation continues and everything that is being said is as far as possible from the truth. No one cares. It's about the lights and the glamour and the stardom. It's about what used to be and fame and money. The entitlement and the resentment grow, always balancing each other out.

The news is everywhere: Leopold James Fitz's company buys another, the deal finally sealed. It feels as if he's buying the whole world, as if money is his national anthem, as if nothing is enough for him. When is it finally going to stop? When he creates a monopoly? Twitter is full of such questions. 

You're a corrupt piece of shit, someone writes under a picture shared by Lance Hunter on Instagram. It's of him and Fitz - the two of them are out camping and are drinking a beer. Fitz cracks one of his ever so rare and ever so precious smiles. It's a shy and tentative smile, but he doesn't look all edges as usual. Within a couple of minutes, the comment section explodes, insults fly, some send death threats and some mention Jemma. An hour later the picture is taken down which is a pity because it was lovely and because someone who had nothing to do with it got dragged into such a mess. It's a pity, but he makes it his new messaging icon, on the phone he uses for family and friends, the one with ten names on it and Jemma's. She looks at that picture a lot, more than she likes to admit, so different from the ones on newspaper articles, Fitz looks like two completely different people.

Here's what people and newspapers don't mention, consciously or unconsciously it doesn't matter: Leopold Fitz raises his new employers monthly salary well above minimum wage and uses some of the money to donate to a couple of charities he believes in.

They're making it way too easy.

Fitz asks Jemma out for dinner, a date even though they never call it such, but she's too busy doing Richard II eight times a week so he buys a ticket for that instead. For a moment he considers inviting Bobbi and Hunter along, buy them a ticket too and take the opportunity to spend some time with them, but then he thinks that maybe he and Jemma can do something later, after the show and leaves it be. 

She sees him standing outside stage door and smiles as soon as she sees him, raising her hand so as to greet him. He smiles back.

Some people compliment her, ask for an autograph, but she excuses herself politely and leaves with Fitz.

"It's good to see you here," she tells him. "Did you like it?"

"I did, actually, very much so. I wasn't expecting... that."

Jemma laughs and he soon follows. Then she says, "Do you have any plans? You could come over. I've got some leftovers and I'm willing to share."

"How can I say no to that?" He smirks. 

As they step into her car, someone takes a picture: it's a blurry one and shows nothing much at all, but it is enough to make trend locally. Some say it's not her, it cannot be. Some say that she deserves more than Leopold James Fitz. Some are indifferent and say, not this again. Some repost the picture and say what a bad, bad girl.

He's quite surprised to find out that Jemma's flat says nothing about her: it's cold and anonymous. All he knows is that she made her acting debut when she was sixteen, made the most desperate career choices and then landed on a TV show he remembers trying to watch and ultimately feel disgusted by: too much drama and no pay-off, if he wanted to feel like shit and panic, he'd stop seeing a therapist and resume contact with his father.

There are her two BAFTAs and her Olivier on one of the shelves, a record player and some Lana Del Rey vinyls. No pictures and no posters. He feels the sudden and irresistible urge to get to know her. he wants to know everything about her. Be friends. Try it out and see where all of this might go.

"Nice place you got," he tells her to fill the silence.

"That's not true! You're a terrible liar, Fitz. You can say it, the place is shite and the only decent thing is the view."

In front of them the city lights stretch themselves to what looks like infinity.

"The place is shite and the only decent thing is the view."

"I know! I've been... Every year I tell myself that I'm moving back to England and I never do it. Some things are hard to quit."

"Didn't know you had plans to go back."

She shrugs. "I don't like this life anymore and one day I'm gonna quit it."

Feel want, taste grief, need friends, she thinks and kisses the corner of his mouth. He turns his head and their lips meet.

"I thought we were meant to have dinner."

"I'm not hungry."

"What if I am?"

"Are you?"

He nods. "A little."

"Alright, dinner it is."

He follows her into her kitchen and helps her lay the small table in front of the window. As they sit there, sharing a spagbol, it feels as if they're out of space and time. Is this what it means to be peaceful, he asks himself. By no means does he consider himself to be an expert. This is who he could be if only he wanted to, who he could have always been. Sitting here, with her, feels like setting fire to the past and to the memory. He's untouchable and can be himself - a surprising and freeing sensation.

"I bought St. Aubyn's novels," she tells him before taking a sip of coke. "It took me weeks to pick them up and even longer to finish them."

Books about hope and survival, about breaking free from conditioning, hatred and resentment. The read is definitely worth the ride, no matter the dread.

"Did you like them?" He asks. His voice falters and it surprises them both.

"Kind off. But I do like that Patrick seems to be on the case and, despite the messiness, he's on the right path."

"Yeah."

Later, as she sits in the bathtub and Fitz sits on the floor, it's impossible to deny that this is real, this is honest, this is them.

* * *

Here's what people are saying; I hope someone casts her in something as soon as they wrap filming.

Here's what people are saying: I hope that Leopold James Fitz ends up dead in a ditch.

They say that the red right hand will wait for him and eventually come for him. They consider themselves to be quite clever because they can quote Milton if they are quoting Paradise Lost and not the song. Paradise Lost makes sense, he thinks, but they don't, so who knows. Truth is that he cannot fathom why punishment should come to him: if there is a God, than he's a rather indifferent one and has long forsaken him. He feels ten again, completely hopeless, saying no one should do that to anyone else.

Fitz replies to a tweet about him and Jemma with a Horrible History screenshot that reads: would you like my private 27-piece orchestra to play something sad? It flies over everyone's heads and brings on another wave of insults, but they laugh about it for days on end. She feels alive. Every time she looks at him all she can think of is saying I like you, it's nice to have a best friend again, but she lacks the clarity and the courage to do so and instead tells him, "Orchestra play something sad."

Time never seems to be enough and then they send her a series of articles that show Fitz with other women and she starts ignoring his calls - she's busy working, that's the official excuse, but she's also upset and angered. Someone sold a story and some idiot keeps tagging her, her phone keeps ringing and she decides to take a social media break.

Well, she thinks, you're a bloody fool. She was the one who wanted to feel something for the first time in a long time and now she feels too much and would rather not to. It's too bloody late, she tells Daisy as she pours them two glasses of gin, too bloody late. 

She's exhausted and her nights are restless. Every time she closes her eyes, she sees Fitz with someone else and it feels odd, wrong - a sharp pain at her heart. It seems impossible, now that she knows him, that he's the Heartbreaking King the press always talks about. Or maybe he is and she's an idiot for believing his act. She shouldn't care, she tells herself, they're not exclusive, maybe they're not even friends. They have fun alright, but that it: this far and no further.

"Is it true?" she asks one day upon entering his office.

"What?"

"What they're saying?"

"No! How could you ask such a tomfool question. You! Who do you think I am, don't you know me?"

She sniffles. "I thought... I thought... Isn't Aida a truthful person?"

"She believes what she says, but she only believes what she wants to believe and only for that moment."

"So it isn't true?"

He shakes his head. "Come on, Jemma."

He doesn’t have the heart to tell her that she's the only woman that matters. The only person he's been seeing in a very long time. It's okay for the world not to like him, it's okay for them to judge him by his carefully constructed façade, but not Jemma. Didn't they promise each other always to be honest and truthful?

* * *

Jemma Simmons is everyone's sweetheart. 

Leopold Fitz looks like he could swallow the world whole, buy everything, earn more money. It never seems to be enough. And it isn't, albeit not in the way people think.

It's summer and the heat is unbearable and Fitz flies back to Scotland to stay with his family. His sister is getting married and he wants to be there. Jemma has been invited too, though she has yet to decide whether to go or not. 

Ghastly summer weather, novel-like heat. It's the kind of heat that makes people behave badly, and quite badly indeed, as drops of sweat run down their foreheads. It's the kind of heat that causes people to lose their temper and be reckless, take it out on the first stranger that passes in the street.

It's summer and Fitz jumps into a pool fully dressed just to avoid one of his little cousins. He screams under water until he feels like his lungs are about to explode and then swims towards the surface to take a deep breath. His wet clothes cling to his skin, an uncomfortable feeling of wet cloth, and he's pretty sure that he ruined his shoes. 

His birthday is approaching and he feels miserable, too many memories, it's like being ten all over again. He hides for an entire afternoon: what if they find him? And what if they don't? Oblivion, he thinks, would be wonderful.

It's his sister who finds him, she quietly sits down beside him and takes her hand in his. 

"I know this isn't easy for you," she says. 

"I think I'm going to get it right this time."

"Are you?" She pauses. "So, this Jemma Simmons. You seem to like her a lot."

Maybe he does, though he ignores the comment, pretending not to have heard it. If he gives the matter too much thought, he might reach unsettling conclusions: the lines between friendship and love are fading down and difficult to see. This far and no further, it no longer seems to work. Fitz shrugs, life always leads you somewhere and then drops you in the shit, he knows that much and doesn't want it to happen with his friendship with Jemma.

I like her more than I did a week, a month, a year ago, he wants to say. The words remain stuck on the tip of his tongue and instead he says, "We're friends."

"You've got to stop pushing people away from you, Fitz.” His sister smiles sadly at him.

"I'm not."

"Aren't you?"

"No, I'm not. Not her."

"Good."

He watches her leave.

That evening he's sitting on a wooden bench in his sister's garden, ready to call Jemma. And to tell her what? Whatever. Hello. The truth. Voices come out the open windows and one of the neighbours is watching Eastenders by the sound of it. He calls Hunter, asks him if they can meet for a beer any of these days as the tears start to roll down his cheeks uncontrollably.

"You're a mess, mate," Hunter tells him.

He knows. He knows. He knows. He thought he was standing a chance, but it's all too much. Fitz gets up and leaves the house, aimlessly wondering around the city, trying not to think about the past. The future is where it's at.

* * *

Jemma does attend the wedding, she takes a train from London and they go and pick her up at Waverley Station - an entire day spent in Edinburgh before they drive home. It's surprisingly normal, freeing, the Fringe and High Street. They buy pies in South Bridge and eat them sitting on a bench in Holyrood Park.

Her hair is shorter and dyed blonde, some period drama she's supposed to film in London. One of those short series that air at the end of December, the quality may sometimes be questionable, but they bring families together - that's quite a good reason for accepting the job, even if it's merely a bunch of scenes.

They say she's doing it to be close to Fitz.

They say that he's jealous of her career and success, of how likable she is and is forcing her to step down.

Anyone who really knows her, she thinks, would know that no one could ever force her to do anything or she wouldn't be where she is.

They dance together at the wedding. Jemma looks splendid in her red dress, radiant and so, so alive. Fitz looks dashing, at peace for the first time in a long time, he certainly feels like it. People always make such a fuss about these things, but they're in love - everyone can see it but them: too focused on the surrounding, on this versions of themselves. This is who they could always be if only they found the courage to say so and do it: away from everything and everyone, incredibly normal. No one seems to care, no one is bothered to ask questions or look at them. And it feels like heaven.

Pictures are taken and uploaded on private accounts and someone leaks them. Social media sites are full of them and in one of them, barely visible, Jemma and Fitz are kissing: after zooming in you can see their tongues, maybe they're making it up because the quality is too low to see anything other than a bunch of pixels.

They say it's disgusting.

They say that the pictures are inappropriate for the public to see.

They say he's ruining her, tainting her.

Disgusting. Bad, bad girl. Someone tweets saying she's the whore or Babylon and people should stop wasting their time on her: the red right hand, the reckoning.

It's disgusting, a complete violation of people's privacy: Fitz's family's and their friends. Theirs too, but she cannot understands the lengths they all go, the entitlement.

Vulnerable, row and exposed: the day is tainted and ruined. It's a riot, it spreads like a wildfire, it's all people talk about.

Fitz wants to joke about people's constant referral to Biblical imagery, but he's too angry - he feels like he could explode, rage boiling inside him.

He's envious, he's using her.

He's gonna betray her. Cheat on her. It's a fling. It's nonsense. It's a publicity stunt. 

"It doesn't matter, it'll blow over," his sister's wife tells them. "We're okay, we'll survive."

But it won't and they aren't. It shouldn't have happened.

* * *

It's raining and they're sitting on the sofa in his living room watching an old TV-show. The end of a lazy day spent doing absolutely nothing. There's a woollen blanket to cover them both, comforting and not really needed, and his head rests on her shoulder.

"Do you ever miss it?" she asks.

He looks at her, puzzled. "Miss what?"

"Home." She pauses. "The sound of rain against the windows, food portions that aren't gigantic, lists of ingredients that do not go to infinity and beyond. Snow in winter, not these warm temperatures all the time. Gosh, I'd kill for a decent cream tea."

"I miss... Scottish summers," he replies. Not home per se, though they say people can be your home and if that's the case, then his is split in three: here, London, and Glasgow.

"Scottish summer, huh?"

"And Irn-Bru. What?"

"I'm serious."

"Me too."

She nudges him with her elbow and laughs, before turning around so as to be able to look him in the eyes. She says, "What if we run away together, Fitz?"

"You want me to elope with you?"

"Elope? What's this the early nineteenth century?" She pauses. "I want to leave this all behind me. We could leave all of this behind if we want to."

She's leaving, that is sure and decided. She's already looking for someone to buy her flat and has told her agent that she's going to take a break: weeks, months, years - she doesn't know, it doesn't matter. She can't do this anymore. It doesn't matter whether or not Fitz follows her or it does and she's barely trying to safeguard her heart and avoid unnecessary heartbreak. But she cannot tell him how to live his life as much as he cannot tell her how to live hers. She wants a home, she wants to disappear, she doesn't want to be known anymore - maybe, maybe, she should tell her parents and allow them to feel a mawkish sense of rightness, let them say we told you so.

"I can't think of anything right now," he says with honesty. "But I'm going to give you an answer. Soon."

The tabloids speculate a lot and Fitz feels sorry for them, their sensationalistic news that are most of the time wrong. It's pity and hatred at the same time, he imagines them in front of their computers trying to care about who does this and who does that - it's seems impossible and inconceivable to think that they care.

Meanwhile he writes Jemma a letter, without malice, telling her that she'll have her answer, but he needs more time: he worked hard to get where he is, he has responsibilities, but he's going to consider her proposition nonetheless.

He helps her pack her few belongings and considers telling her the truth. How hard can it be to express his feelings? Not that much, surely, plenty of people find the courage on a daily basis. wants to say, here it comes, Jemma, I love you. But what if she answers by saying that he can say it as much as he likes but there's no chance?

They say that when you throw a coin in the air, your decision is already made. Heads: he runs away with her and leave all of this behind. Tails: he stays and they live their lives apart, an entire ocean between them. He wants the coin to tell him to run away with her.

They say it's Fitz's fault that Jemma is leaving: a bad breakup and the sudden and somehow divine realization that he's a piece of garbage. Why isn't he the one to leave the country? Why does it always have to be her?

* * *

"Do this, Fitz. Do that, Fitz. Like a fucking toy soldier!" He yells.

His voice echoes inside the conference room. It doesn't matter for this outburst of rage is worth it - years and years of anger coming out in an explosive mix. Later, he'll feel sorry and apologize, but now he merely wants to give everyone a piece of his mind: He's tired of bullies. Never again.

"Fuck off, all of you!" He pauses. " And I know you all want me to say that I'll change, that I'll change my mind. That the way we do business will change, but there's something I've learned in the last couple of years. They don't fucking care. And those bastards are worse than us, and no matter what I do or say they won't believe it."

Every tale condemns him as a villain, why prove them wrong? He spent years pretending to be the man his father wanted him to be: his rich, he's powerful, and he hopes that Alistair Fitz looks at newspapers knowing that this is the son he so desperately wanted, knowing that he won't ever touch him again. This life sometimes it does nothing more than rekindle the memories he so long wanted to forget. The biggest fuck you, at the time it seemed like a sensible thing to do. Maybe it wasn't, for wouldn't it be much better to own the courage to be himself without shame, without having to pretend? Go on with his life and chose life instead of the ghosts of the past? Piece and quiet, maybe Jemma was right all along: those are where it's at.

"Mack here will take my place, I trust him with the leadership of this company. Radcliffe will help him with his expertise."

"Sir-"

"It's final."

Over and done with. What's the point of having your own company if you can't help from home?

* * *

Leopold James Fitz arrives on an Autumn afternoon and Jemma Anne Simmons picks him up from the train station.

The air is crispy and smells of rotten apples and dead leaves, of oozing resin, of destruction and hope.

This too is a beginning.

They say that they've been friends since forever, that it's impossible to reduce such a short and strong relationship to a couple of years. Some say that great minds think alike, that some people are meant to be together and not necessarily in a romantic way. Both are right, more or less.

Whatever the reason, it's impossible to deny that these two strangers seem at home in such a secluded and isolated place. It suits them. The place likes them as much as they like it, it's welcoming and benevolent, it wants them to prosper and find rest and happiness. No longer restless and chasing perfection, it doesn't matter who they are and what their past is, because there's a peculiar sense of satisfaction and elation that oozes of them. Almost contagious. , Flawed individuals who've escaped their unpleasant lives and have found comfort in each other and above all love: they look like two people who made it.

They used to call them Miss Americana and the Heartbreak Prince, though this is a title that was soon forgotten. Now they call them Fitz-Simmons without malice and without assumptions behind it, without reducing them to an indistinct whole. It's about the fact that there seems to be a natural space at their side to fill - inevitable and slightly right.

* * *

Outside mist covers everything and the whole world looks as if it has ceased to exist, as if it was swallowed overnight. The weather forecast predicts a sunny and clear day albeit a cold one, the kind of weather that makes walking outside a complete pleasure.

Early morning, Jemma pours some water into the kettle and switches it on before taking two Dunoon mugs from the cupboard. They're old and chipped and one day they'll have to replace them, throw them away or use them as vases, but they're precious - the only remains other that the memories of the weekend trip to Dunoon, the main town on the Cowal peninsula in the south of Argyll and Bute.

Two bags of tea, English Breakfast, and the sugar already there. Some grains fall on the counter and she plays with them by lining them up in thin white lines before collecting them and throwing them away. Biscuits too, dark chocolate Digestives - they never fail to remind her of her first breakfast with Fitz.

Heavy steps and Fitz's blurred reflection in the kitchen window. He gets closer and hugs her, his arms around her, holding her close: the embrace feels like home.

This is it, they've made it. And it's a blessing.

He rests his head on her shoulder, his stubble ticklish against her skin.

"Good morning," she whispers.

"Good morning." He pauses. "Jemma?"

"Yes?"

"Will you marry me?"

"Where's the ring? There usually is one involved, or so they tell me."

"I don't have a ring."

"No?" She pretends to be shocked.

"It's a tad difficult to find them here. There's just cows and ponies wearing knitted sweaters." He laughs. "I love you, will you marry me?"

"Marry you?" She pauses and laughs. "Shouldn't we say that we'd like to be more than friends first?"

He kisses her cheek, his stubble ticklish against her skin. "Here it comes then, the best part of my day happens as soon as I open my eyes. And I want to be more than friends, because you're more than that. So, will you marry me?"

"Yes, I will."

"Without a ring? Because I can get one this afternoon after my therapy appointment."

"I don't care about the ring, Fitz," she whispers. "I just want you."

Every story has an ending, but this is merely the beginning.


End file.
